Will Ms. Yellow Sweater please stand up?

Here  I am.

Before you think I totally lost my mind, read this Double X piece on pro-life feminists (yellow sweater wearers).


I am a pro-life feminist. Which means to me that I find abortion to be a moral choice and one I am equally adverse to as any other taking of life, including the death penalty, murder, war, etc.  I do not think abortions should be illegal.  I do not think women or doctors should be harmed or penalized if an abortion is performed.  I do think that we should do everything within our power as a society to prevent un-intended pregnancies (unwanted ones) AND offer real support to women and families like low or no-cost child care, paid maternity leave and effective child support enforcement. 

Are there more women out there with their yellow sweaters hidden in their closets?  Do pro-life Democrats, like Senator Bob Casey have a chance in this partisan, hot-button issue, no time for nuanced discussion, time? I would hope so.  I would vote for her.

People who equate feminism with pro-choice miss out on a whole bunch of women.   I am not even sure what pro-choice means.  I am supportive of women being able to make informed choices regarding their reproductive and sexual health, but I don't believe that most women "choosing" to have an abortion really have a choice. They are faced with obstacles like abuse, poverty, social stigma, isolation, and lack of opportunity.  Some women don't have the choice of when and with whom to have sex or if and when to use birth control.  So how much choice is there really?!

All women should be for real reform in how we support and protect women and families.  Abortion is a symptom or effect of many causes.  Feminism is about more than our bodies, and more than ourselves.

Contraception as a end to poverty for the world's women? Don't forget education.

Nicholas Kristoff wrote an op ed earlier this week about contraception as a tool to end poverty for many of the world's women and families.  He also wrote a follow up piece on the challenge of building consensus on this issue.

His main point is that women in many parts of the world lack knowledge of and access to effective and safe birth control methods.  Some of the barriers are due to culture and religion.  Children are valued as signs of virility, wealth and health.  Women are expected to produce children for their husbands, at least one every few years.

We have proven that education is its own special kind of contraception.  Where girls and young women are educated, they delay motherhood and have fewer children.  Why is this?  Because they are empowered members of society and the workforce (in many cases).  They do not have to rely on a husband to take care of them, and so can make decisions about when to have children and how many to have.   Children who have educated mothers (often employed mothers) are more likely to go to school and delay their own motherhood.  Poverty and ignorance breed more poverty and ignorance. 

If you keep a girl in school, you help her change the course of her life, that of her future family, and an entire nation....It’s a simple and well-documented fact. A girl who goes to school and stays there is much more likely to postpone marriage and childbirth. Those decisions have a dramatic ripple effect. Later childbirth results in lowering the overall fertility rate, which means higher per capita income and the increased ability of a woman to earn a living for herself and her family. And educated women provide better health care for themselves and their children, meaning lower maternal and infant mortality rates. In fact, a country's investment in education leads to a whole host of results that promote economic and social development. 

- Cokie Roberts (in Save the Children's The State of the World's Mothers 2005)

 
Simply handing out condoms and birth control pills will not change the fate of women and children in this world.  For one thing, men are in control of when and with whom they use condoms.  Many women in the world, from any walk of life or continent, do not have the power to negotiate condoms use with their partners.  Just look at the numbers of women with HIV/AIDS for evidence of this.

From The Body (for women in the U.S.):

Today, women account for more than one quarter of all new HIV/AIDS diagnoses. Women of color are especially affected by HIV infection and AIDS. In 2004 (the most recent year for which data are available), HIV infection was

• the leading cause of death for black women (including African American women) aged 25-34 years.
• the 3rd leading cause of death for black women aged 35-44 years.
• the 4th leading cause of death for black women aged 45-54 years.
• the 4th leading cause of death for Hispanic women aged 35-44 years.

From Avert: 

At the end of 2008 it was estimated that out of the 31.3 million adults worldwide living with HIV and AIDS, around half are women.¹ It is suggested that 98 percent of these women live in developing countries.² The AIDS epidemic has had a unique impact on women, which has been exacerbated by their role within society and their biological vulnerability to HIV infection.
Generally women are at a greater risk of heterosexual transmission of HIV. Biologically women are twice more likely to become infected with HIV through unprotected heterosexual intercourse than men. In many countries women are less likely to be able to negotiate condom use and are more likely to be subjected to non-consensual sex.^3 4

So the issues are more complicated than simply trying to prevent pregnancy for women who either cannot provide for a child or do not desire to have any/more children.  It is about controlling and ending a pandemic that has infected millions.  It is about saving millions of children from a life of poverty and lack of education or opportunity.  It is about decreasing maternal and infant mortality, which is a significant problem in the developing world, due to many factors, including lack of access to prenatal care and properly trained health care providers and necessary resources.  So yes, we need more contraception and family planning in the world, but we also need schools and the political will to make sure the world's girls get the education they deserve.

Stuff of interest to thinking mamas.....

• Are we raising a generation of whiners? From You Need A Budget.
• Haluski: How to deal with lying with our young kids?
• Are Men Made to Work not Parent? from Stroller Derby
• Avoid Emotional Spending by Avoiding Your Triggers, from Wise Bread.
• How Many Retirement Accounts Can You Have? Answers from Cash Money Life.
• Could Birth Control Pills Really Be Defined as Abortions? from Blogher
  

Would you have more kids if Dad helped more?

Equally Shared Parenting has an interesting post about a Psychology Today article that postulates that women would be inclined to have additional children if their partners helped more with care giving and household chores. My first reaction is that this is partially true, but is also an over-simplification of all the dynamics and factors that go into the decision to have another child/ren.

In my family, we have discussed and thought about the decision to have another child over the last year. To tell you the truth, I am still undecided. And even if I knew my partner was going to pitch in 50% of the time on child care, housework, etc. I still would be undecided. For me, the decision has a lot more to do with financial stability, personal and family long term goals, and the comfort and well being of the three people who are already in existence (my partner, our son, and myself). In our dream world, we would have 10 kids. But we could never have the financial, emotional or physical resources to do that one right. And the idea of another person in our family both thrills and terrifies me.

Some of my reasons against having more children are purely personal/selfish. I don't know whether I want to give up sleep, eating sushi, drinking too much on occasion, working (whether short term or long term), etc. I don't know if I want to postpone my career and education for a few more years. I don't know if I want my body to go through another pregnancy/breastfeeding relationship.

And then there are the family-related reasons: money, goals, dreams, standard of living, etc. It will require more money to take care of another person, particularly if we have to/want to send him/her to private school or have to move to a more expensive but better school district. We also have some family dreams for the kind of place and house we want to have in the next several years. We would like to travel to far away places. We would like to save lots of money for retirement and the boy's education or dreams. Kids suck up time, money and energy. And I'm not sure I want to sacrifice anymore.

Don't get me wrong, there's a whole other side of me that wants lots of kids in the house, messing it up with craft projects and their toys. Part of me doesn't care about money and believes we would work it out. Part of me wants a sibling for my son. A part of me realizes that I'm only getting older and 35 is not that far away. I don't want to be giving birth or chasing a toddler at 40. And having a kid now will mean that I will delay career and education for only a couple of years more max, and have all this baby/toddlerhood stuff in the bag.

I wish I was one of those people who just knows they want two kids or five kids or no kids. I'm ambiguous. I'm a lot confused and a little scared to make a decision. And my partner is willing to wait or go with the flow or make a baby tomorrow. But you know what else, I also know deep down that I will still be responsible for most of the kid and house stuff and that does make the whole second kid thing less appealing. So maybe those psychologists are on to something....

Natural Family Planning Update

Well, I have been tracking my basal body temperature and cervical fluid for almost 3 months now, with the help of fertilityfriend.com. And so far, we haven't goofed and made a baby. I am surprised to learn that my cycle is 26 days long. I always had a longer cycle before the birth of the boy. But I suppose I could still be recovering from the mini-pills, and my cycle has not regulated itself.

One of the ironies of the Fertility Awareness Method of birth control is that the very time I am most interested in sex is the time of the month I should avoid it, since I am most fertile. Now the strict Natural Family Planning adherents abstain during their fertile period. Fertility Awareness offers the alternative to use a barrier method during the fertile period if you want to have sex. Without getting into details, we manage to negotiate through the fertile phase without any real challenges.

Partnership is compromise, and this method of birth control requires both diligence and flexibility. I think it is the most feminist of contraceptive measures, because it requires equal commitment from both partners; although as the female I'm the one who tracks my temperature and cervical fluid. But my partner is aware of where we are in my cycle and what our options are at any given time. I like it because I'm not the sole responsible party. We do it together or abstain together.

I'll be sure to update in a couple of months to see if I'm still in love with the method and still not knocked up.

Adventures in Family Planning

When we decided to add a person to our family, we had no idea what it would take to actually create the individual. Well we knew the fun part and the basic biology, just not the how much time/energy it would require. I had been taking low dose birth control pills for a few years. From all my reading and conversations with others I was under the impression that it would probably take a few months (at least) for me to ovulate and thus be able to get pregnant. Well, that ain't true for me, at least not in 2005. The very first cycle after I stopped the pills we got quite a surprise. We were planning (how silly of us) to start "trying" in December or January so the baby would arrive in the fall. This timing would go well with my work calendar, so I could finish up our major projects before checking out on an extended maternity leave. Well, our son was born in the beginning of August, right in the middle of the busiest time for my office. Not as planned, but surely perfect nonetheless.

Well, that was all prelude to now, 20 months later. I am home full time with O (and trying to do my own freelance thing), my partner works full time (and then some) so "we can have most of what we want most of the time", as he just quipped this morning. We are pretty sure we don't want any more children now, maybe ever. I say pretty sure, because we both make wistful comments about another child, but we also are reluctant to take on all the added pressure and needs a new family member brings. We enjoy our threesome; this kid is pretty close to perfect now. Who wants to roll the dice again? Not us. Not now anyway.

To add to this decision-tree of fun, I don't want anymore hormones pumped into my body for the purpose of preventing another pregnancy. Besides my general reluctance to ingest pharmaceuticals, I want my body to be relatively free of outside influences now. I am interested in seeing how it feels to be me without birth control pills, pregnancy or breastfeeding adding to the mix. Plus, for once I don't want to be the only person responsible for our family planning. I am tired of the responsibility the pills require. I rarely do anything on time on a daily basis. Even with my phone alarm reminding me, I still flaked pills once in a while. Ok, maybe it was more like once a month. Yeah, I'm not so good with taking multi-vitamins regularly either.

So I went to the midwife and asked about options. At the time I was still breastfeeding, so my options were limited. The things I considered: an IUD and diaphragm. The diaphragm got knocked off the list quick because I knew it just wasn't' going to work for me and could lead to some stupid and risky chance-taking. The IUD sounded good logically, especially because it could offer years of contraception, but could be removed at any time should we want to conceive. But there's just something about having something inserted into my body that would stay there for years; well, it freaked me out. Plus, I didn't want to have to check to make sure the string was still where it was supposed to be. I'm not giving any details, if you don't know what I'm talking about. Look it up.

Being the connected mommy I am, I sent a message to my like-minded mommy friends to see if they had any experience with natural birth control or family planning. Well, really it was prompted by this article about cyclebeads. I thought that the beads offered a no-brainer solution to lazy crunchy types like me. But thanks to my thoughtful and experienced comrades, I realized the potential problems with that particular method. For instance, what if I have a wacky cycle or forget to slide the bead (I did forget to take pills, right?!). But they didn't just nay-say. They offered two resources that I am loving and using today.

First a friend recommended the book, Taking Charge of Your Fertility. I have read it and found it informative and practical. I now know more about my fertility and menstrual cycle than ever before, and I thought I was pretty informed. Basically, in order to know when you are most likely to become pregnant you need to chart a few data points: waking temperature, cervical fluid, and the optional cervical position. And then from this information you can follow four rules of contraception, which I'm not going into because the book can explain it far better than I. You could also know when it makes the most sense to try to conceive. All without fancy equipment, pharmaceuticals, or stress.

I have been charting for about a week: temperature and fluids. It's not glamorous, but with the help of my other new tool, Fertility Friend I see how this can be addictive. Well, for people like me who like charts and the illusion of control that information gives. If we ever do want to try to conceive again, I will be armed with some useful information (provided I keep up with the charting). If we are having difficulty conceiving we can look back on my data and see if there's a pattern indicating a problem with my cycle or an infection, etc.

As you can probably tell, I am in the honeymoon period with our new birth control method. Provided I do the work and we stick to the program, well we will remain a happy family of three. But if we get things a little wrong and it results in another member of the family, well, we'll still be happy. I think that's really the key to using natural family planning methods; you either have to be ok with the prospect of conceiving or be sufficiently motivated by not wanting to conceive that you abstain when necessary and not only chart religiously, but follow the "rules".

I'll report back with our progress. Pray for us.